Engineering, 2013, 5, 215-220

doi:10.4236/eng.2013.51b039 Published Online January 2013 (http://www.SciRP.org/journal/eng)

Harmonic Measurement and Analysis during Electric

Vehicle Charging*
Mohd Zamri Che Wanik1, Mohd FadzilMohd Siam1, Afida Ayob2, Subiyanto2, Azah Mohamed2,
Abu HanifahAzit3, SaharuddinSulaiman3, Mohamed Azrin Mohamed Ali4,
Zahrul Faizi Hussein1, Ahmad Kamil MatHussin1
1
TNB Research Malaysia, Malaysia
Power System Research Group, UniversitiKebangsaan Malaysia, Malaysia
3
TNB Distribution Malaysia, Malaysia
4
Malaysian Green Technology Corporation, Bandar BaruBangi, Malaysia
Email: mzamri@tnbr.com.my

Received 2013

ABSTRACT
This paper presentsand describes harmonic measurement and analysis of studying harmonic propagation during electric
vehicle (EV) charging. The measurement study is performed on a golf cart and two modern type of EVs. Harmonics
from a single EV charging and a group of EV charging was measured. The voltage and current waveform during the
charging was captured and analyzed to investigate the harmonic components that exist in the electrical system. Total
current harmonic distortion (THDi) and total voltage harmonic distortion (THDi) were both calculated. Modern electric
vehiclesare found to release low THDi but higher THDv compared to a golf cart. On the measurement study during
charging of a group of EV, it is found that the summation of THD is not linear with a number of vehicles. The finding
of the study reveals that harmonic contamination from EV charging on electrical grid is not as critical as thought by
most of power system researchers and engineers.
Keywords: Electric Vehicle; Total Harmonic Distortion; Electric Vehicle Charging; Harmonic; Power Quality

1. Introduction
In light of high energy usage, environmental pollution and
rising fossil fuel prices, current dependence on internal
combustion engine (ICE) technology employed in vehicles
should be reduced and the widespread use ofelectricvehicle
(EV) as the transportation of choice in 20 to 30 years
time should be increased. It is estimated that EV vehicle
penetration will increase gradually where 35% is projected
at 2020 and will reach 50% by the year of 2024 [1-2].
The general effect on distribution systems caused by
the spread of EV will be substantial load increase and
large increment of system voltage and harmonic distortion. Another issue that should be considered is the coincidence between the charging start time and the eventual
evening load peak period, which varies with customer
and country.
For charging, EVbatteries need DC current so the grid
AC current will be converted to DC by battery charger.
The charger is basically the rectifier/inverter with con*

TNB is an abbreviation for TenagaNasionalBerhad which is a main

electrical utility company in Malaysia. TNB research is a research arm
of TNB.

Copyright 2013 SciRes.

troller integrated with protection circuit. This is where

the concern rises because inverter/rectifier is known asa
harmonic source. So one of the concerns with electric
vehicle charging is the harmonic contamination to the
electrical grid.
There is no agreement however on how much the total
harmonic distortion (THD) can be released to the network during charging. In one of the published report,
total current harmonic distortion (THDi) is reported between 2.36% to 5.26% at the beginning of charging and
reaching up to 28% at the end of charging. However total
voltage harmonic distortion (THDv) is claimed only to
range between 1 and 2% with power factor close to unity.
For commercial chargers, THDi from measurement recording values are between 60% to 70% [1,3-4].
The concern of the engineers and researchers are when
a large number of EVs charging simultaneously to the
power system grid. What is the sum of THD when EV
multiplies in numbers?Many believethat THD will increase with the number of vehicles. It is however difficult to find a report that discusses this issue. Moreover
the values indicate in the previous paragraph was reported [3-4] more than 10 years ago so the valuesdo not
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represent the actual amount ofharmonic generated from

state-of-the-art charger technologies that is used in modern electric vehicles.
The study reported in this paper tries to investigate the
harmonic distortion from a single EV and a group of EVs.
The measurement was performed on an older type of EV
and two modern types of EV. The results of the study is
useful in understanding the harmonic distortion contribution from EV connected to the grid for charging.
This paper is organized as follow. First EV technology
is briefly reviewed.The harmonic distortion limit then
highlighted. Harmonic measurement during a single vehicle charging is then presented. Finally the harmonic
distortion during charging of a group of EV is discussed
and commented.

2. Electric Vehicle Technology

Electric vehicle that will be seen creating issues on the
power system gridwill be of two types. First type is plug
in hybrid where there is a combination of ICE and battery.
The second type will be all electric vehicle where this
vehicle depends solely on battery. For both types of EV,
electrical power is needed from the grid for charging.
Example of typical PHEV hardware arrangement is
depicted in Figure 1. This is for parallel type of PHEV.
There is also series type of PHEV but the focus of this
paper is on the grid connection issue so it is not important if the EV is of parallel or series type. For all electric
vehicle, the components in the light green dash lines are
not needed and removed leaving only batteries, charger,
power electronic drive and propulsion electric motor.
When EV is charging, the only active components are
charger and battery because EV is not moving. For grid
interfacing studies, the EV can be represented electrically
as depicted in Figure 2. Battery charger is basically a
rectifier which converts AC current from the grid to DC
current to charge the battery. The rectifier is normally of
active type where the power electronic devices are employed for switching devices. In this diagram power
electronic devices are IGBT.

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Figure 2. Battery charger circuit diagram [6].

EV charger is normally of conductive type eventhough

inductive type is available. Conductive chargers have
direct plug-in connection to the supply e.g. using an extension power cord to plug form the wall outlet into the
EV. Inductive charger on the other hand use magnetic
coupling as a mode of energy transfer. Comparing these
two types, conductive charger is simpler to design, having higher efficiency and more popular.

3. Harmonics Distortion Limit

Harmonicsdistortion has detrimental effects on electrical equipment inside power system.Severity of harmonic is determined by the percentage of total harmonic
voltage distortion. Harmonic voltage is referred to as a
sinusoidal voltage having frequency equal to an integer
multiple of the fundamental frequency of 50/60 Hz
supply. Total harmonic distortion is calculated as follows[7]:
40

THDu =

(U h )2

h=2

U1

(1)

40

THDi =

( I h )2

h=2

I1

(2)

In Malaysia,the main utility company, TenagaNasional

Berhad, has set a limit on total harmonic voltage distortion according to voltage level as tabulated in Table 1.
For current there is no distortion limit set.

4. Harmonic Measurement

Figure 1. PHEV typical layout [5].

Copyright 2013 SciRes.

A few field measurement activities were conducted investigatethe harmonic during EV charging. The measurement is performed using Fluke power quality meter. The
picture of the meter is portrayed in Figure 3. The meter
has the capability to directly display the voltage and current
waveforms in real time. In addition, the measurement
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M. Z. C. WANIK

data can be saved into the memory of the meter for

further analysis.
For individual harmonic, three types of electric vehicle
is compared. The first type of EV is a commercial type of
modern EV ( EV1). Second type is modern EV prototype
(EV 2). Third type is a golf cart. Due to classified and
sensitive issues, the name of the manufacturers and the
brand of these EVs are not disclosed.

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respectively. Figure 10 shows the voltage and current

waveform for the golf cart. Figure 11 and 12 shows
THDv and THDi for the golf cart which are 1.1% and
34.4% respectively.

Table 1. THDv limit in TNB Distribution system [7].

Voltage Level

THDv

33 kV

3%

11 kV

4%

0.4 kV and below

5%

Figure 5. Total voltage harmonic distortion from EV 1.

Figure 3. Fluke power quality meter.

Figure 6. Total current harmonic distortion from EV 1.

Figure 4. Modern EV 1 voltage and current waveform.

Figure 4 shows the voltage and current waveforms of

EV 1. Figure 5 and 6 show THDv and THDi for EV 1
respectively. THDv and THDi after analysis are 1.5%
and 11.6% respectively. For EV 2, the voltage and current waveform are depicted in Figure 7. THDv and
THDi for EV 2 is 1.2% (Figure 8) and 9.2% (Figure 9)

Copyright 2013 SciRes.

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M. Z. C. WANIK

Figure 7. Modern EV 2 voltage and current waveform.

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golf cart can be explained due to lower current magnitude drawn during the charging. For modern EV, even
though THDi is lower, THDv is higher than measured for
golf cart. This is due to higher current magnitude drawn
by modern EV.

5. Harmonic From a Group of EV

Figure 8. Modern EV 2 total voltage harmonic distortion.

In the previous section, THDv measured from a single

EV was presented. The value was recorded lower than
limit set by utility. But the concern on harmonic is when
a group of EVs connected to the grid simultaneously for
charging. There are many engineers who thought that the
summation of THD from a group of EVs is linear with
the sum of EV.To find out the answer, a measurement is
performed to measure THD from a group of EVs.
In Malaysia, modern EV is not yet commercialized so
the study cannot be performed on the commercial EVs.
But there are many golf carts available which can be
used in the study. The results will not represent the modern EV harmonic but the main objective is to investigate
the sum of THD from a single EV and a group of [EV].

Figure 9. Modern EV 2 total voltage harmonic distortion.

Figure 11. Golf cart total voltage harmonic distortion.

Figure 10. Golf cart voltage and current waveform.

The measurement results reveal that the THDi from

chargers is low for modern EV but for THDv, modern
EV is releasing higher distortion. The lower THDv from
Copyright 2013 SciRes.

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219

Figure 12. Golf cart total current harmonic distortion.

The measurement was performed at a golf club at

Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia. The measurement was
carried out on a working day. On that day, it was raining
from early morning until 10:00 am. But the golfing activities were active where all golf carts left the charging
point by 9.00 am. The first golf cart returned to charging
station after 11 am. The time, number of vehicle, and the
line where they are connected are detailed in Table 2.
The measured quantities are voltage and current harmonics
distortion. The measurement data was recorded initially
every one hour interval until 6:00 pm. Starting at 7:00 pm,
the golf cart start to arrive more often so the measurement was taken for every 15 minutes.
The data are visualized through a graph as shown in
Figure 14 for THDv and Figure 15 for THDi. Instead of
time, the number of vehicles is used for x-axis to facilitate the pattern of consumption from these EV. The line
where these golf carts are connected were also identified.
The consumption starts to increase substantially starting
from 6:30 pm (18:30 hrs) when golfers start to return the
golf cart to the pick-up point.

Figure 14. Measured THDv during monitoring.

Figure 15. Measured THDi during charging.

Figure 13. Golf Club distribution Circuit.

Table 2. Time, number of vehicle and connection.
Connection

Time

Number of Vehicle

L1

L2

L3

11:00
12:00
13:00
14:00
15:00
16:00
17:00
18:00
18:30
18:45
19:00
19:15
19:30
19:45

0
1
1
1
1
2
3
0
6
12
16
18
20
22

0
1
1
1
1
2
3
0
4
4
8
8
8
8

0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
2
4
4
6
8
8

0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
4
4
4
4
6

Copyright 2013 SciRes.

The THD is also measured both for voltage and current

as shown respectively in Figure 14 and Figure 15.
Eventhough THDv for each single vehicle was measured
1.1% but a PCC, the value is only 0.7% for onevehicle.
With the increaseof vehicles connected, the THDv steadily increase. For eight vehicles on L1, the recorded
THDv is only 1.9%.
For THDi of one vehicle, THDi 34.4% is recorded but
at PCC, THDi is recorded 47.8%. With the increment of
golf cart charging the THDi value at PCC decrease to
16.6% for 3 vehicles but increase again for12 vehicles.
Surprisingly THDi do not increase much when vehicle
increase from 16 to 22 on L1.

6. Conclusion
In this paper, the harmonic measurement study and analysis during electric vehicle charging is presented. The
measurement is performed on golf carts and two modern
types of EV. The measurement result shows that modern
EV release lower THDi compared to a golf cart which is
expected. Unfortunately for THDv, modern EV cause
higher percentage of distortion. For a group of EV
charging, THD for both voltage and current are found not
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to be the direct summation of the THD from a single vehicle. The results of the study areuseful in understanding
the harmonic distortion contribution from EV connected
to the grid for charging.

ET

[2]

EPRI, Environmental Assessment of Plug-In Hybrid

Electric Vehicles, Technical Report 1015325, July 2007.

[3]

J. Orr, et al, Current Harmonics, Voltage Distortion, and

Powers Associated with Electric Vehicle Battery Chargers Distributed on the Residential Power System, IEEE
Trans. On Industry Applications, Volume: IA-20, Issue
4,1984

[4]

J. Gomez and M. Morcos, Impact of EV Battery Chargers on the Power Quality of Distribution Systems, IEEE
Power Engineering Review, October 2002.

[5]

Emadi, A., Transportation 2.0., IEEE Power and Energy, Vol. 9, No. 4, July/ Aug. 2011.

[6]

W.Kramer, S. Chakraborty, B. Kroposki and H. Thomas,

"Advanced power electronic interfaces for distributed
energy systems - part 1: system and topologies," National
Renewable Energy Laboratory, Golden, Colorado, Tech.
Rep. NREL/TP-581-42672, Mar.2008.

[7]

Malaysian Energy Commision, The Malaysian Distribution Code,

http://www.tnb.com.my/tnb/application/uploads/uploaded
/the%20malaysian%20grid%20code.pdf

7. Acknowledgements
This investigation study is part of a project jointly carried
out by TNB Research Malaysia, UniversitiKebangsaan
Malaysia, TNB Distribution Malaysia and Malaysian
Green Technology Corporation. The project is funded by
TNB Research Malaysia through funding TNBR/RD55/
2012 and partly supported by UniversitiKebangsaan Malaysia via research grant GGPM-2011-071.

REFERENCES
[1]

R. Liu, L. Dow and E. Liu, A survey of PEV Impact on

Electric Utilities,IEEE PES Innovative Smart Grid
Technologies Conference, January, 17-19, 2011, Anaheim,
CA, USA

Copyright 2013 SciRes.

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